The average prices to buy a house or rent an apartment in the San Joaquin Valley are at or near their historic high points, putting a tighter squeeze on affordability than before the pandemic.
Prices for homes in the Fresno metropolitan market were calculated at just shy of $400,000 as of June 2024. That’s the highest median price in 16 years, according to real estate technology firm Zillow . And it’s up by about $124,000 — or almost 46% — since January 2020, less than two months before the first coronavirus cases were reported in the Valley.
“Several factors have contributed to this significant increase,” said Gary Carter, board president of the Fresno Association of Realtors . “The Federal Reserve’s historically low interest rates during the pandemic period made borrowing cheaper, boosting demand for homes and driving up prices.”
Carter said the Fresno market has also seen a shortage of homes available for sale, which, “coupled with increased demand, has exerted upward pressure on prices.”